Can you fix your own water softener The timer and cycling functions seem to work but the water does not get soft.?

If your water softener timer and cycling functions seem to be working correctly, there are at least three more items to check: salt in the brine tank, clogged eductor nozzles, old resin For the water softener to work correctly, it needs to regenerate. Typically a household softener is set to regenerate every 3 to 7 days and most units are designed to regenerate at night when no one is using water. During regeneration, the softener will pull brine (very salty water) from the brine tank and rinse this brine through the softener resin tank slowly to "refresh" the resin beads inside the tank. If this process doesn't happen, the softener will deliver hard water. This process will fail if: there is no salt in the brine tank for the softener to pull out or if there is no water in the brine tank to dissolve the salt. At the end of each regeneration, the softener pumps water back into the brine tank so it will dissolve salt for the next regeneration. Things to check: 1) is there salt in your brine tank? 2) is there water in the brine tank before the regeneration starts? (usually 5-10 inches of water, depends upon the model and size of brine tank) You might not see the top surface of the water if you have lots of salt in the brine tank. 3) during the regeneration process, which typically runs 60-120 minutes, watch to make sure that the level of water draws down (slowly) and later fills back up. If the level is not going down and back up during regeneration, it is possible that the "eductor nozzle" is blocked. This is a small plastic component with a tiny hole in it that can easily become clogged. On almost all softeners it is quick and easy to remove the eductor nozzle, flush it with water and replace it. consult your owners guide. If there is salt in the brine tank and the water level is going up and down, and this softener is 5-10 years old or older, it is likely that the "ion exchange resin beads" inside the softener tank are 'dead'. A typical household softener has 0.5 to 2 cubic feet of resin beads inside the tank depending upon the model and the hardness of the water that is being treated. The tiny plastic ion echange beads in the tank get regenerated every few days, but after hundreds of regenerations, and/or exposure to high levels of impurities and/or chlorine they can 'wear out'. Replacing the beads is a messy job and you need to be careful in the process so you don't accidentally end up filling the pipes in your home with loose beads. Unless you're particularly handy, strong and have a way to suck out and replace the beads, it is probably best to hire a water softener dealer to test your resin beads and replace them if needed.